Life Memories of Torger Sjursen Leland (1850-1933) in 1932 – A Life Memoir

I wrote an AI-assisted couple biography for Torger Leland and Anna Natvig in  ABC Biography of Torger Sjursen Leland (1850-1933) and Anna Ellingsdatter Natvig (1853-1911) Family of Norway, Wisconsin, Montana, Washington and California based on the genealogical information at hand.

I wondered what Torger Sjursen Leland might say in a life memoir to his grandchildren in 1932.

(AI NotebookLM Infographic of the lives of Torger and Anna Leland)

1)  Based on the genealogical sketch, I requested Anthropic Claude Sonnet 4.5 to create a memoir told by Torger Leland about his life in 1932.  The prompt was:  "Please write a life memoir for Torger Sjursen Leland based on the attached biography, as he might tell to his grandchildren in 1932."

2)  The AI Anthropic Claude Sonnet 4.5 memoir (lightly edited for accuracy) is:   

Grandfather's Story

As Told by Torger Sjursen Leland to His Grandchildren

San Francisco, California - 1932

Sit down, children. Your old grandfather has lived eighty-two years now, and there are things you should know—stories you should carry forward when I'm gone. I've seen this country change from wilderness to wonder, and I've traveled from one end of it to the other. Let me tell you how it all began...

The Old Country (1850-1856)

I was born in Mølster, in Voss, Norway, on the 26th of March, 1850. You children can't imagine what Norway was like—mountains so tall they scraped the clouds, fjords so deep and blue they seemed to go on forever. My father, Sjur Torgersen, was a farmer there, and my mother, Brithekept the house and raised us children.

I remember very little of Norway, you understand. I was only six years old when we left. But I remember the mountains. I remember the church where they christened me when I was just a baby. And I remember the day my father told us we were going to America.

"America," he said, "is where a man can own his own land. Where our children can have a future."

My mother cried. My grandmother cried. Everyone cried. But Papa was determined, and his brother Ivar was going too, so at least we wouldn't be alone. 

The Crossing (Spring 1856)

We traveled to Bergen in the spring of 1856. I was six years old, my brother Ole was four, and little Mathias was just three. We boarded a sailing ship called the Hebe. She was new, Papa said, and he hoped that meant she was safe.

I remember that ship like it was yesterday. The smell of tar and salt water. The creaking of the wood. The way the deck tilted and swayed until I thought I'd lose my breakfast every minute. My mother kept us close, always worried one of us boys would fall overboard.

Three weeks we sailed! Can you imagine? Three weeks on the open ocean. Some sailing ships took two months or more, but the Hebe was fast. We landed in Quebec, Canada, and I remember my father saying, "We made it. We're in the New World now."

But we weren't done traveling—not by a long shot. We went by steamboat, then canal boat, then railroad train. I'd never seen a train before! The noise, the smoke, the speed of it! We went through Chicago—already a big city even then—and Milwaukee, and finally to a little place called Edgerton in Rock County, Wisconsin.

From there, we traveled to Deerfield in Dane County, where an old friend of my father's from Norway, Bryngel Larsen, had already settled. That's how we ended up in Deerfield, Section 25. That became our home.

Growing Up American (1856-1876)

Those first years were hard, children. Harder than you can imagine. We lived in a small cabin at first. My father and the other men worked to clear land, plant crops, build proper houses. We had so little.

And then little Mathias died. He was only three years old. We'd brought him all the way from Norway, survived the ocean crossing, and then we lost him. It nearly broke my mother's heart. That was our first winter in Wisconsin, and it was brutal. We buried him in the spring.

But life goes on, doesn't it? My father farmed, and as soon as I was big enough—maybe eight or nine years old—I was working alongside him. Plowing, planting, harvesting. Feeding the animals. Chopping wood until my hands were covered in blisters. That's how you grew up in those days. You worked.

By the time I was ten, I could speak English pretty well, though at home we always spoke Norwegian. My mother never did learn much English. She didn't need to—everyone in our community spoke Norwegian.

I went to school when I could, in the winter months mostly, when there wasn't as much farm work. One-room schoolhouse with children of all ages. The teacher was a young woman from Madison. She taught us reading, writing, arithmetic—the basics. But I left school for good when I was about thirteen. I was needed on the farm, and besides, I'd learned enough to get by.

Learning a Trade (1865-1876)

When I was about fifteen, I started learning carpentry. There was always building to be done—barns, houses, sheds, furniture. I found I had a knack for it. I liked working with wood, liked seeing something take shape under my hands. My father encouraged it. "Farming is hard," he said, "and you can't always depend on the weather. But people always need carpenters."

So I worked as a farm laborer for other families, and I worked as a carpenter's apprentice, and slowly I built up my skills and my reputation. By the time I was twenty, in 1870, I was working for the Andrew Less family in Dunkirk. Good people, they were.

Around 1876, our whole family changed our name. We'd been Sjursen -- or the Americans called us Severson -- but that was confusing. Every generation, the name changed, you see? So we decided to take a permanent family name, the American way. We chose Leland, after the farm name (Liland) of my uncle Ivar's wife back in Norway. That's when I became Torger S. Leland instead of Torger Sjursen.

That same year, 1876, I became an American citizen. I went to the courthouse in Madison on April 13th and swore my oath. I had to renounce King Oscar the Second of Norway and pledge allegiance to the United States. It was a proud day. I was twenty-six years old, and I was finally, officially, an American.

Meeting Your Grandmother (1876)

Six weeks later, on May 30th, 1876, I married your grandmother, Anna Ellingsdatter Natvig, at the Koshkonong church.

Anna was a wonderful woman. She'd come from Sogndal, Norway, with her family when she was about nine years old—a few years after my family came. She was twenty-three when we married, and I was twenty-six. Both of our fathers stood up for us at the wedding.

I remember thinking she was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen. She had kind eyes and a gentle way about her, but she was strong too. She had to be. Life was hard for farm wives.

Building Our Life (1877-1911)

We settled in London Township, still in Dane County. I worked as a carpenter and farmer—whatever work I could find. We bought three-quarters of an acre in 1885. It wasn't much, but it was ours.

And the children came. Ten children your grandmother gave me. Ten!

First was Edwin in 1877. Then Severt in 1878—that's your father, some of you. Then Bertina, then another little Anna, then Theodore, then Herman, then Mabelle, then Lewis, then Arthur, then Ruth.

But we lost three of them. Little Anna Amanda died when she was only three years old. Baby Herman lived only nine months. And Bertina—she lived to be twenty-three, old enough that we thought she was safe, and then we lost her too. That was in 1903.

You never stop grieving your children, no matter how old you get. Your grandmother and I, we'd lie awake at night sometimes, just talking about them, remembering them.

But seven survived, thank God. Seven strong children who grew up and had children of their own. Some of you sitting here now.

By 1910, I'd moved up in the world. I was working as a foreman in the tobacco warehouse in Deerfield. We owned our house—still had a mortgage, but it was ours. Mabel was teaching school. Arthur was working for the railway. Ruth was still in school. My brother Ole, he never married, lived with us his whole life. He was a good carpenter, Ole was, and a good uncle to my children.

Losing Anna (1911)

Then came 1911. October of 1911.

Your grandmother hadn't been feeling well for about six weeks. She didn't complain much -- she never did -- but I could see she was in pain. Finally, we took her to the hospital in Madison. Cancer, they said. Cancer of the gallbladder.

They operated, but it was too late. She died on October 26th, at 7:25 in the evening. She was fifty-eight years old. We'd been married thirty-five years.

[Here the old man's voice would break, even twenty-one years later]

I buried her in St. Paul's Liberty Lutheran Church Cemetery in Deerfield. Right there where we'd built our life together, where we'd raised our children, where we'd been happy.

I was sixty-one years old, and I didn't know what to do with myself.

Following My Children West (1912-1933)

My children had started moving west -- to Washington State, to Montana, and eventually to California. There was nothing keeping me in Wisconsin anymore. Your grandmother was gone. The children were grown. So I followed them.

I lived with Arthur and his family in Washington for a while. Worked on his farm. It was good to be useful, to work with my hands again. Then I stayed with my sister Isabel—your great-great-aunt—and her son's family in Chelan County. They had a fruit farm. Beautiful country out there, different from Wisconsin, but beautiful.

And now here I am in San Francisco, living with your father Severt and your family. I'm eighty-two years old. I've lived through things you can't imagine. When I was born, there were no railroads in Norway. No telephones. No automobiles. No electric lights. No airplanes!

I crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a sailing ship that took three weeks. Now you can do it in five days on a steamship, and they tell me someday people will fly across in airplanes in just hours!

I left Norway when I was six years old and never went back. I became an American. I raised seven children who became Americans. And now there are grandchildren and great-grandchildren, all of you Americans, born in this country.

What I Want You to Remember

I'm an old man now, and I won't be here much longer. But I want you children to remember some things.

Remember that your family came from Norway. From the mountains and fjords. We were farmers and workers, honest people who did our best.

Remember that we were immigrants. We came here with nothing but hope and strong backs. This country gave us a chance, and we took it.

Remember that life is hard sometimes. We lost children. We lost your grandmother. We worked until our hands bled. But we survived. We built something.

Remember to work hard. Nothing good comes easy. I've been a farmer, a carpenter, a foreman, a farm worker in my old age. I've done whatever work needed doing, and I've never been ashamed of honest work.

Remember family. Take care of each other. Your grandmother and I, we built this family from nothing. From two Norwegian immigrants came all of you. That's something to be proud of.

And remember to be grateful. Grateful for America, grateful for the chances you have, grateful for each day you're given.

I've lived eighty-two years. I've seen so much change. I've traveled from Norway to Wisconsin to Washington to California. I've been a boy in the mountains, a young man on the frontier, a husband and father, a widower, a grandfather, and now an old man waiting for his time.

When I die—and it won't be long now—bury me next to your grandmother in Deerfield. That's where our American story began. That's where I want it to end.

[Torger Sjursen Leland died on March 18, 1933, just shy of his 83rd birthday. He was buried, as he requested, beside Anna in St. Paul's Liberty Lutheran Church Cemetery in Deerfield, Wisconsin, where their American journey had begun seventy-seven years earlier.]

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3) An Audio Overview (essentially a podcast) created by the Google NotebookLM AI tool) describing this memoir of Torger Sjursen Leland in 1932 is here (click on "Audio Overview" and wait for it to load).

4)  The Video Overview of Torger Sjursen Leland's memoir, created by the Google NotebookLM AI tool, is:  

5)  I edited the Claude biography text to correct minor inconsistencies and errors. Every large language model (LLM) AI tool writes descriptive text much better than I can write. The AI tools are very perceptive, insightful and create readable text in seconds, including local and national historical events and social history detail when requested.

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Links to my blog posts about using Artificial Intelligence are on my Randy's AI and Genealogy page. Links to AI information and articles about Artificial Intelligence in Genealogy by other genealogists are on my AI and Genealogy Compendium page.

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